The Globe and Mail's Trials of Nunavut series was warmly received by readers, many of whom left thoughtful comments on Patrick White's
main story and any number of the features attached to our
multimedia presentation.

Here are the top 10 highest rated comments by our readers as voted by you:

Phil B: Well done, G&M. This is the most substantive piece I've seen in a long time. I would have liked to see this saved until after the election so that it gets the attention it deserves. Thanks for not offering simple solutions or making these issues crassly political. That being said, this article certainly puts our $15 billion+ fighter jets into perspective. Instead of swinging at cold war shadows, we should be dealing with the very real, very pressing social crisis in the arctic. At the very, very least, the feds could partner with Nunavut on an addiction treatment centre. Can Ms. Aglukkaq not find any money for mental health in her riding?

More related to this story

This Baffin Correctional Centre inmate has worked his way up through Iqaluit’s correctional system from the juvenile detention centre. His nickname, tattooed on his back, is his own Inuit play on the word ‘gangsta.’
Peter Power/THE GLOBE AND MAIL

Earlier

the mind in its own place: The only thing unique about this situation is the climate. The same story has unfolded, sometimes even more tragically, everywhere Europeans came in contact with Neolithic societies. What should they have done? Ignore these societies and not permit contact with the modern world? This would have been condemned as the worst sort of racism - we would just be treating the people like the fauna of wilderness reserves. Engage these societies in the modern world? Again, we would be considered guilty of cultural genocide, which is the road we've taken. There was no win-win option once these two worlds came into contact.

That said, if the Inuit are not Canadians, then none of us are. They must have roles of responsibility in the Arctic. There should be a Coast Guard HQ up there, complete with real icebreakers, a Canadian Forces HQ, a Search-and Rescue HQ, and training facilities so that they can have access to these vital jobs and serve their territory and their country. Arctic research centre, Centre for high-latitude medicine, there are lots of possibilities that are not simple and degrading make-work programs.

The article insinuates however that the communities in Nunavut were somehow healthy at some point. They never were. They were doomed from the time the Canadian government forced a nomadic people to settle and forced them to be Christian and remain settled rather than free reign to be nomadic.

Aslo, stop comparing the Arctic to the rest of Canada. It IS a developing country. All of Canada's Arctic 50,000 people if you take out Whitehorse and Yellowknife. A group of 50,000 spread over an area larger than India, with a harsher climate than pretty much anywhere else on earth poses problems. They will NEVER have a lifestyle like the rest of Canada.

I live in Canada's Arctic.

7370 Km to the East: Very good feature. I hope a lot of Canadians read this. I worked up in Nunavut for only a few months, and I study Arctic Sovereignty...as far as the region goes, there is so much talk about the obvious- international law and resources (and of course the odd reactionary proclaiming that the region will blow up into an arms race, and conflict). Yet we don't hear enough about the citizens who are up there. Citizens that most Canadians have a problem not only placing, but identifying. There is a culture up there, and even a nation. Yet it's failing in its current state. We need to start talking more about helping the people, because there is no better way to claim our sovereignty over the Canadian Arctic and Northwest Passage, than by including the caretakers of the region and its environment into our successful society, and doing it by respecting who they have always been, not what we want them to be.

Good job, this is the kind of important feature that deserves attention.